Rivals Lee Westwood and Rory McIlroy teed-up for a Tucson showdown

Lee Westwood of England waves to the gallery after winning his quarter-final at the Accenture World Match Play. Photograph: Matt Sullivan/Reuters

Lee Westwood and Rory McIlroy would never admit there is no one else they would rather beat than the other man, but it is true.

And now they will get their chance in Sunday's semi-final of the Accenture World Match Play. High noon in Tucson, you might say, except the Englishman and the Northern Irishman will be expected on the first tee at 7.20am.

"It is the match I wanted. It's the match everyone wanted. I'm looking forward to meeting him on the tee,'' McIlroy said after an impressive 4&2 victory over Sang-Moon Bae of South Korea in his quarter-final match.

Westwood followed him quickly back into the clubhouse, equally impressive in sweeping aside Martin Laird of Scotland on the 16th green.

The language used in professional golf can be obtuse at the best of times but the 22-year-old McIlroy could hardly have been more obvious if he had taken off his golf glove and slapped it across Englishman's cheek.

It would be stretching the truth to say the two Ryder Cup colleagues are the worst of enemies but, equally, they are far from being the best of friends these days. "We definitely don't spend as much time together as we used to,'' McIlroy said when asked to describe their relationship. Westwood said: "Rory doesn't want to spend much time with the people who manage me and I don't want to spend much time with the people who manage him."

This was a reference to the McIlroy's decision last autumn to leave ISM, the sports agency he shared with Westwood – a decision described by the Englishman at the time as "bizarre". But there were also issues between them revolving around what Graeme McDowell so artfully described as "jokes with jabs".

Beautifully put, though it is safe to assume McIlroy did not find much to laugh about in Westwood's remark at Augusta last year after the Northern Irishman's collapse on the final day of the Masters, that his young friend "has a pull hook in his bag" under pressure. Unkind, to say the least.

McIlroy put that one to bed a few weeks later, winning the US Open by eight shots with not a pull hook anywhere in sight. If anything, the 22-year-old has improved as a golfer since then. His ball-striking remains a thing of wonder but he is a better putter these days and the inconsistency that was once a feature of his game week in and week out seems to have been evened out.

Westwood, of course, has become a by-word for consistency in recent years. After some seriously hard work on and around the practice green he has a short game to match his driving and iron play.

"The way Lee plays you know he's going to hit a lot of fairways and a lot of greens,'' McIlroy said. "He's going to put you under pressure all day and he is not going to give you any holes. So I'll have to play exactly the same way, hit a lot of green and fairways and give myself chances. I think it will come down to who holes the most putts."

It would be quite a match in any circumstances but there is also the additional incentive of replacing Luke Donald at the top of the world rankings. If either man goes on to win this tournament he will assume the mantle of world No1 – an honour that Westwood has held before and which the Englishman insisted does not rank particularly high on his priority list.

McIlroy, on the hand, has never been to the mountain top before. He would like to see the promised land. "The possibility of going to No1 definitely gives the match a bit of extra spice,'' he said. As if it did not have enough spice already.